Chapter Three

Despite a part of her wanting to be homeschooled, Bella slept on it and decided she wasn't going to confine herself to Charlie's house just because she had been dumped and lost her memories of the past three months. She was better than this, she shouldn't let herself be defined by a stupid breakup. She wouldn't let herself be defined by Edward Cullen anymore.

In the late evening of Sunday, Bella sat curled up on her bed and looked down at the diary she had yet to continue reading about. She knew what the other Cullens looked like, but she hadn't gotten to what Edward Cullen had looked like. So, without any distractions, Bella finished what her first day at Forks was like.

Edward had effortlessly messy auburn hair that framed his perfect features, a few of the bangs fell a little around his right eye so he always had to push it backwards. His eyes were deep golden, the only other person in the family who had darker golden eyes was Jasper. I didn't think too much about it, apparently the doctor and his wife adopted/fostered them all because they all suffered from the same eye condition…though I don't know what would cause them to have golden eyes….

Anyway, Jessica wasn't that thrilled to talk about Edward, apparently, she had asked him out a couple of times in the past two years and he had said no. He wasn't worth the effort; I should save myself the heartbreak of asking him out because he didn't date.

Maybe he just said that because Jessica wasn't his type?

The entire time I ate lunch I could feel the eyes of the Cullens on me, burning a hole into the back of my skull. A part of me was aggravated, while the other part was overwhelmed. Something stopped me from turning around and flipping them the finger. Maybe it was because I didn't want to put any energy into doing so.

I ended up sharing my next class, Biology, with Edward. He didn't say anything to me, and it was awkward. His fingers were embedded into the biology lab table in front of us. His jaw was clenched, his eyes darker than before. A hurricane could arrive, and he wouldn't even move from the wind, it seemed as though he was rooted to his spot.

I asked Charlie about the Cullens at dinner but according to the Chief-of-Police, Dr. Cullen and his family have been nothing more than a proper family. Dr. Cullen could have taken any job he wanted for a whole lot more money, but he decided to come here. Esme is one of the best interior designers and helps restore antique furniture and houses.

Anyway, that's really all that happened, but what a first day at Forks High it was…I can only hope coming here will have been the right decision.

-Bella

Wow.

Now she understood why she was attracted to Edward, apparently, he was swoon-worthy, along with the rest of his siblings. Yet, it was as though there was something else about him, something off. What was it that made him odd, different from the rest? She needed to have been attracted to someone, in more than just a pretty face sort of manner. Sure, looks helped, a lot, but looks would eventually fade. Whatever it was about Edward, it was enough for her to eventually date him, so that meant he must have had a good sort of personality.

Knocking on her bedroom doorway made Bella look up, before she turned and looked up to see Charlie standing in the doorway. He had a bag full of food from their trusty, and only stapled down in the town restaurant, The Lodge, again. It smelt delicious and Bella blushed as the tasty scent came traveling over to her and took over her senses.

"What are you reading, kid?" Charlie probed, carefully, though he was calm and letting her know he wouldn't be upset if she didn't tell him. She was tempted to hand it to him, before remembering it was her diary. There were things he wasn't supposed to know. At all.

"I'm reading my diary, to try and see what I missed the last few months," Bella remarked, earning a nod from Charlie though there was a sadness etched across his whole being. She knew he was thankful she had decided to come back to Forks after all, and hadn't decided to move to Jacksonville with Renee and her stepdad, Phil. Still, hearing this only made it more real.

"I just finished reading about my first day at the high school. Was it really that taboo about the relationship the siblings had with each other?" Bella couldn't help but ask, finding the Cullens quite interesting enough now, she could see where there could be interest in her being drawn to them now, especially with how beautiful they were.

Charlie shrugged.

"I didn't think too much about it, it's not like they were blood or anything. Well except for the twins, but even then, they weren't dating each other. I still don't see what was so special about them, they were like any other kids."

Bella nodded her head as she absorbed what her dad was telling her. She knew Charlie probably didn't want to think about the Cullens, especially with how they had left. He probably lost all respect for Dr. Cullen and Mrs. Cullen, obviously he didn't care for Edward. On the other hand, Bella had no idea what he thought about them.

"Was I automatically into Edward? Did I look like I had a crush on him, anything like that?" Bella probed, waiting patiently. Charlie shuffled from where he stood before he let out a big sigh, tiredness dripping from him.

"No, but it didn't take long for you to start dating him either. Never liked him, there was something off about him. He seemed like he had a controlling personality, the very few times that I had seen him he was always hanging on your back. He was making sure you were doing everything the way he wanted you to. I'm glad that your relationship didn't last, but I'm not glad about the way it was done," Charlie confessed, as Bella listened intently to him.

To be honest, if she did have memories of Edward, actual memories, the way Charlie was talking would hurt her feelings. She didn't really have feelings left of him, whatever feelings she had for him were gone and it was strange.

Sure, she felt sometimes she was missing something, more than anything she wanted the past three months back, but did she necessarily need the parts that had to do with Edward? Did she want to find out that her life here was based completely on a boyfriend who was controlling, manipulative even?

She didn't care to be defined by a relationship, like she had thought before. She wasn't going to start finding out more about her past, only so she could end up tracking down Edward. She inwardly flinched at this idea, of her going all the way to L.A. and falling onto her knees, telling him she had gained her memories back so that meant they could be together again.

No. No. No.

She would not be like that.

"Bells, are you okay?"

Bella blinked, as she pushed that train of thought away and instead looked at Charlie. She assured him she was fine when he soon asked her, before he left her bedroom and shut the door behind him, leaving her to her own devices. She put her diary back in its usual spot it was sitting at, before she leant back against her mattress and peered up at the ceiling of her bedroom.

She cleared her mind from the subject of the Cullens for the rest of the night, but when she went to sleep, she was welcomed with golden irises in the obsidian nothingness around her, her heart racing in her chest. She woke gasping for breath, sweat dripping down her skin as she wondered why she was suddenly greeted with those golden eyes. They were both a relief and a curse at the same time, to let her know they were in the recesses of her mind.

The next morning, she woke and dressed in another casual outfit, realizing she would probably be wearing the most casual and bland clothes for the rest of the time she would be here. She would keep her hair plain, and not wear much makeup, not that she was someone who cared about wearing too much makeup. She just didn't see a reason why she needed to wear cuter clothes, nor did she see a reason why her appearance needed to be more extravagant when she was merely at school.

Charlie was gone, as always, and she tried not to have it bother her as much as it did. She had never relied much on her parents; it was something she had learnt at an early age. Charlie didn't have the chance for her to rely on him, maybe it was part of the fact he only got to see her for two weeks a year (in summer, in California actually). Renee relied on her, had relied on Bella as soon as Bella was able to be relied on.

Bella didn't want to say it, but when she first watched the movie Matilda she had cried, truly cried because she realized how her childhood had been stolen from her. She was supposed to be outside, playing on the swings and chasing the ice cream truck down the road. She was supposed to go down to the neighborhood clubhouse and swim in the swimming pool with the other children. She was supposed to be an actual child, not burdened with adult problems at such a young age.

Frowning, Bella shook her head away from those memories. It was quite funny, how she would have rather lost her memories from before she had moved to Forks instead of after moving to Forks. She wouldn't have to have the memories of a stolen childhood. She would be able to focus on her relationship with Charlie without the past getting in the way.

Realizing she needed to leave to get to school at a proper time, Bella grabbed her truck keys before rushing out of the house. She didn't have to worry about ice on the steps as she ran down them and got into the truck. She pulled out of the gravel driveway and went out onto the road, heading straight to the high school (hating how she couldn't push the truck more when it came to speed).

Reaching the high school, Bella sighed and leant back against her front driver's seat, her eyes going up to the ceiling of the truck. She mentally prepared herself for the day, barely able to get out of the truck before Jessica came sweeping upon the scene and smiling brightly at Bella. (Bella tried not to grimace at the excitement Jessica had, no one needed to smile as wide as Jessica was)

"Bella, I'm so glad you're back! I thought you wouldn't come back," Jessica explained, earning an inward sigh from Bella before she went in the direction of Mr. Mason's classroom with the brunette next to her.

Mr. Mason didn't question her on why she wasn't in school for the rest of the week, when it came to last week. He didn't tell her she needed to worry about all the information she had missed out on. He merely welcomed her into the classroom again, along with the rest of the students that were around her. They watched her, breaths held as she finally reached her usual spot and sat down.

The entire time she was in the classroom, Bella wanted to be in the school library searching about the Cullens. She wanted to look at their school photos in the yearbooks from both this year and the last two years. She wanted to see if they were as beautiful as her past self-claimed them to be. She was quite poetic in her diary, a little on the too descriptive side but she was a writer.

There was a saying where a woman thought herself a poet when she actually was the poem. Maybe she happened to be a poem. Then again maybe she was being too deep about it. All she knew was Bella found comfort in writing with all her heart and soul, even if she wasn't planning on publishing a novel or even writing one to begin with.

Classes blurred together, and when lunch came, Bella hurried into the cafeteria before grabbing a premade meal and went out of the cafeteria. She knew Jessica would be upset; Angela wouldn't say anything but hold intrigue. The others she didn't care about, those two were supposed to be her friends outside of the Cullens.

Entering the cafeteria, she was welcomed with the librarian arching one of her eyebrows up when the teenager reached her. Bella glanced at the plaque on the desk, letting her know the librarian was named Mrs. Smith. The woman was nearing the age of retirement and seemed to be someone who didn't allow any tomfoolery in the school library.

"You must be our famous amnesic student. Miss Swan, I presume?" the woman probed, earning a nod from Bella before she quickly added, "yes, ma'am."

"Well, how can I help you? I know you haven't been in the library before the accident. What would compel you to enter the library? Do you wish to study your work you have received from your teachers? Or do you wish for solitude?"

Bella didn't like how Mrs. Smith was overbearing, how she was someone who needed to know what business the students had. She just wanted to look at the school yearbooks, and when she told the woman this, the woman wordlessly reached behind her to the tall bookshelf behind the librarian desk. She plucked the navy-blue and golden yearbooks out before handing them over to Bella.

"Find one of the tables in front of me. Nowhere else, since these are the only copies the school has given me. I also notice how you have food and drink; I suggest you go outside and eat at the bench before coming back, you need your strength," Mrs. Smith commanded, letting the girl know there was no way she would dismiss what she would say.

So, Bella did what the librarian asked of, she went outside and ate her meal. The wind was quite prominent today. It messed with Bella's hair, and it was quite chilly. She almost wanted to wrap her arms around herself as she ate her food and drank her orange juice. She finished as fast as she could, before she hurried into the warmth of the library. Mrs. Smith seemed pleased with the fact that Bella had listened to her instructions.

Sitting down at one of the tables where the yearbooks were, since she had left them on the front desk, and the woman had sat the yearbooks down, Bella opened the yearbook from two years ago. She noted how some of her classmates looked a good bit different than they did now thanks to puberty. There were some that looked the exact same.

Bella's heart stopped for a moment in shock when she saw all the Cullens were in front of her on the C section of the yearbook. The pictures might be in black and white but there was no mistaking them from the description she had written down in purple ink within her diary. They were inhumanely beautiful, there was no possibility they could have received that beauty naturally.

In fact, it actually was quite creepy, to be honest. They had no smiles upon their faces and their eyes were hollow. It was almost as though they were acting, they were only here because they had to be here. They had to fill these roles because they had to be. They didn't want to be here, but it was being forced upon them.

"Ah, I see you are looking up pictures of your ex-boyfriend and his family. I was wondering the reason why you needed those yearbooks. Makes sense. Always thought they knew they were too good for this town. Turns out I was right."

Bella almost wanted to tell the woman to leave her alone, but she knew it wouldn't change the truth. The Cullens did think they obviously were better somewhere else than here. As soon as they found a loophole into leaving, they took the first chance they could. It just so happened her losing her memories and breaking up with Edward, they had found that loophole.

"Yes, it turns out they thought they were too good for us after all," she mumbled, with a sour tinge to her voice, before she slammed the yearbook closed. She dismissed how Mrs. Smith was giving her a sour look of her own, not liking how Bella wasn't respecting her yearbooks after all.

"Thank you, but I need to head to Biology, I shouldn't miss my classes. I'm already far behind enough as it is," Bella stated, before she got up from the table and left the library.

Hot tears were dripping down her face, and her jaw was clenched. How dare Mrs. Smith says something like that! And how dare she obviously be right about it?

Bella wiped away the tears, not realizing where she was going, before she tripped and fell onto the ground. She cussed, not noting how someone was running up to her until they went down to the ground. She noticed how it was Mike Newton who had fallen next to her. Great. The one person she didn't want to see her, instead she had to have Mike.

"Bella! Are you okay? What's wrong?"

Without thinking she pushed him away from her, she didn't want him near her. In fact, she didn't want any man near her right now. She probably would have pushed Charlie away if it were him coming towards her, because men lied. Men left, Edward left, and his foster father was keen on that idea.

"Get away from me. I don't want to be touched or coddled or told to go to the nurse."

Mike frowned, but wisely did not say anything. He allowed the girl to get up from the ground and dust herself off. She went towards Biology, making sure she straightened her spine. She knew her face would be puffy and there would be red tinged eyes. She smoothed down her hair and tried to make sure she kept her face devoid of emotion.

Mr. Banner watched her with intrigue as she entered the classroom but didn't say anything. He knew she was going through hell basically with how she had been abandoned by her boyfriend along with losing her memories. So, he instead turned his attention away from the brunette and looked down at his lecture notes. He had a separate section of notes he had written for Bella.

Reaching her desk, Bella climbed up and sat down. She flinched a little bit from her sore muscles but that was to be expected. She just was ready for her ribs to heal, and for her to not have that clunky cast on her damn foot. She at least didn't have an arm cast, that would have been even worse for her. Especially for her mental health.

Mr. Mason did not call her during class, there was no point. Partly because he had a completely different lecture for Bella, in case she needed help. He almost wished the poor girl would stay after class and ask him for help. He could tell she was breaking down mentally on the inside, along with emotionally. He didn't know how he would have dealt with it if his daughter (who was now in her final year of college) had gone through the same thing with her own boyfriend.

School ended, and Bella drove as fast as she could home without making the engine break down with steam coming out. She'd end up calling Charlie in the end, and then he would end up calling Billy. Billy would end up calling the mechanic at the Reservation. He'd insist that he would pay for the repairs since she was basically his goddaughter, and it was originally his.

When she arrived home, Bella went into the house and upstairs to take a shower. She turned on the shower head as hot as she could. She got into the shower after undressing herself, and almost flinched from the hotness of the water. She liked the heat, she liked how it burned.

She almost stumbled where she was, when a flash of crimson eyes appeared in her mind. She turned off the water as fast as possible, wondering why she had crimson orbs appear in her mind instead of golden orbs. She hurriedly got out of the shower and cleaned herself off before she changed into some lounge clothes.

She managed to calm herself down and get rid of all the tears that had fallen down, along with the puffiness in her features, by the time Charlie came home. He didn't give her a second look when he arrived home, before he went upstairs to change out of his uniform and into his own pair of lounge clothes.

Focusing her attention on the food she was making for dinner, something she had found from her grandmother's recipe book, Bella tried to push away the crimson orbs from her mind. She kept having her mind go back to those red eyes. She wondered if she would later read about those crimson eyes, or she would only be welcomed with the golden orbs.

Charlie came into the kitchen, complimented on the food with a smile on his face since the meal happened to be from his mother's recipe book. Bella on the other hand hadn't really heard what her dad was saying, her mind was a thousand miles away. She didn't know what to truly think about.

Once they were sitting at the table, Bella began to cut pieces of her seasoned chicken only to glance up and notice how Charlie was glowing with happiness. She almost wanted to ask him the reason why he was smiling but he said something first.

"I'm glad to see you were in school all day. How was it? Was it too overwhelming?" Charlie probed, only for Bella to inwardly flinch at the remembrance of how it was kind of overwhelming.

She instead gave him a warm smile, though it didn't reach her chocolate hued eyes. Charlie could tell she wasn't there completely but didn't comment on it. She would tell him in due time if there was something she wanted to tell him.

"No. Nothing to report. I had a normal day," Bella remarked, before she ate a couple of pieces of the chicken. She kept her eyes down and noticed how the seasonings were soaked into the chicken. It was a lovely meal, but she wasn't in the mood to talk.

"Do you have a lot of homework?"

Bella almost wanted to scoff at the comment, but because of the fact it was her dad, and he was being nice she bit away the scoff. She instead shook her head, allowing him to know wordlessly she wasn't given a lot of homework. The other students on the other hand had instead gotten a lot of homework, something she had realized now was actually a blessing.

Once she was finished with her meal, Bella cleaned both her and Charlie's plates manually. She knew there was a dishwasher, but she wanted to keep her hands busy. She cleaned them a little slower than she needed to but nonetheless she got the job done.

Going upstairs, Bella changed into a pair of her lovingly worn pajamas before she brushed her out in the bathroom. She brushed her teeth and turned off the bathroom light before softly going into the bedroom. Getting into the bed, Bella turned off the lamp next to her before she pulled the covers over her. The last thing she was thinking about was those golden and crimson orbs.

author's note: I hope you enjoyed the latest chapter of 'Handle with Care'. For some odd reason I just thought of bringing in the 'plagued by red eyes' earlier into the story than I thought.

as always: Twilight doesn't belong to me

-Emmy

edited: 3/11/2022